The Huffington Post refers to Chris Christie’s defensive stance on mammograms for younger women as his "macaca moment." I beg to differ… but only at first.

Once again, another white, male, Republican politician demonstrates to the potential voters of his still blue state that he thinks being a woman is a pre-existing condition, i.e., reason enough to deny coverage for a test prescribed by a woman’s doctor.

Does it really matter how young or old a woman is, if her doctor has detected a possible lump in her breast and has written her a scrip for a mammogram?

Perhaps the statistics do support Christie’s utilitarian notion that older women are more susceptible to breast cancer, but that does not validate denying coverage when a woman’s doctor thinks there may be a problem. In fact, younger women do develop breast cancer with some frequency, and oftentimes they develop a more virulent type. And, younger women with a family history of invasive breast cancer must surely exercise special care, if they wish to live a long, full life.

I found some statistics for Mr. Christie, should he or one of his aides happen to be reading here:

Breast cancer incidence in women in the United States is 1 in 8 (about 13%).

In 2008, an estimated 182,460 new cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to be diagnosed in women in the U.S., along with 67,770 new cases of non-invasive (in situ) breast cancer.

About 1,990 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in men in 2008. Less than 1% of all new breast cancer cases occur in men. [emphasis mine]
[...]
Besides skin cancer, breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among U.S. women. More than 1 in 4 cancers are breast cancer.
[...]
A woman’s risk of breast cancer approximately doubles if she has a first-degree relative (mother, sister, daughter) who has been diagnosed with breast cancer. About 20-30% of women diagnosed with breast cancer have a family history of breast cancer.

[Again, because it represents little threat to his own health (like Jon Kyl not needing maternity care), Chris Christie feels free to be cavalier about the health of younger women, perhaps even the mothers of his children's friends.]

I found an earlier article, too, from Oprah’s magazine, that discusses a "virulent, fast-acting type of breast cancer attacks more than twice as many young black women as all other women."

Another site, dedicated to young survivors of breast cancer, has some breath-stopping statistics and bullet points for action:

Young women CAN and DO get breast cancer. While breast cancer in young women accounts for a small percentage of all breast cancer cases, the impact of this disease is widespread: There are more than 250,000 women living in the U.S. who were diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 40 or under, and approximately 10,000 young women will be diagnosed in the next year. But, despite the fact that breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in women ages 15 to 54:

Many young women and their doctors are unaware that they are at risk for breast cancer.

There is no effective breast cancer screening tool for women 40 and under.

Young women are often diagnosed at a later stage than their older counterparts.

There is very little research focused on issues unique to this younger population, such as fertility, pregnancy, genetic predisposition, the impact of hormonal status on the effectiveness of treatment, psycho-social and long-term survivorship issues and higher mortality rates for young women, particularly for African-Americans and Latinas.

Young women diagnosed with breast cancer often feel isolated and have little contact with peers who can relate to what they are experiencing.

As the incidence of young women with breast cancer is much lower than in older women, young women are underrepresented in many research studies.

Most of us already know–although perhaps Mr. Christie does not–that there is a definite gap in health care access and outcomes based on race and ethnicity. Meanwhile, those of who did not already know about gender as a pre-existing condition are fast getting up to speed on this issue (still wondering to ourselves why it is okay to deny care to victims of domestic violence).

Does Mr. Christie hate all women, only younger women, or just young black women? I think he or his aides should make this point clear, if he truly wishes to avoid his own "macama moment."

Frankly, I am beyond tired of posting about gender as a pre-existing condition in the context of denying health care, but I will not ignore these pieces of news as they arise, and I suspect that there will be still more of them to come. So far, I have detected little ability among the GOP and perhaps the Blue Dogs, to learn from the mistakes of their colleagues when it comes to foot-in-mouth disease.

Likewise, I am also weary of asking polemical questions about hate, but apparently, that is the only language that is understood in the wider world, when one wishes to make a point about the cavalier behavior of those who know how to make only utilitarian arguments. And it is a parallel structure, after all, according to the standards they have set for themselves, rhetorically speaking.